How are your brackets looking?
IF ARIZONA coach Sean Miller was hoping for some redemption after getting caught up in an FBI investigation into his program’s alleged illegal recruitment tactics, Buffalo quickly ended that thought.
The 13th-seeded Bulls controlled the game from start to finish and routed the scandal-ridden No. 4 Wildcats 89-68 Thursday night in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament, busting brackets all over the country.
Miller was caught on multiple FBI wiretaps talking about offering $100,000 to Deandre Ayton to entice the big man to commit, according to an ESPN report in February.
The conversations were between Miller and Christian Dawkins, an employee of Andy Miller’s ASM Sports. Miller only sat out one game, which the Wildcats lost to Oregon, after news of the wiretap came out. The coach maintains that he will be “vindicated” when the university investigates the report by ESPN.
“I have never knowingly violated NCAA rules while serving as head coach of this great program,” Miller said then. “I have never paid a recruit, prospect or their family to come to Arizona, and I never will.”
Ayton, the player at the center of the Arizona scandal, finished with 14 points and 13 rebounds in the shocking loss to Buffalo, but the towering center was largely ineffective on the defensive end as the Bulls’ speedy guards ran circles around him.
Buffalo shot a blistering 54.8 percent from the floor (34 for 62), including 50 percent (15 for 30) behind the 3-point line to win the first NCAA Tournament game in program history. They will face No. 5 Kentucky in the second round on Saturday. “I felt like we had a shot,” Buffalo coach Nate Oats said. “I didn’t think we were going to win like that.”
Coming into the tournament, Arizona players were trying to forget about the FBI investigation hovering over their team.
“As basketball players, we have a job. And we’re not going to let outsiders, outside noise, let it mistreat us, in a way. We’re just going to keep pushing, keep grinding,” senior guard Parker Jackson-Cartwright said following Arizona’s first game after the ESPN report.
But whatever outside noise there was clearly had an affect on a lackluster Arizona squad that threw in the towel midway through the second half Thursday night.
Buffalo slowly pulled away after the break, stretching the lead to 25 points before emptying the bench with 1 minute, 11 seconds left. The Bulls made 9 of 14 3-pointers in the second half (64.3 percent).
Wes Clark scored 25 points and Jeremy Harris added 23 to help the confident Bulls pull off the biggest upset of the tournament’s opening day. — Staff & Wire reports